Week Three

Journal Activities

• 1. How would you define a duty? Give an example of a duty that you had in the past or have right now.
• 2. Philosophers who work within deontology,the school of ethics that deals with obligations and duties, have talked about positive and negative duties. Positive duties are duties to do something, like you may have an obligation to take care of your younger brother or sister. Negative duties are duties to do nothing: you may have a negative duty when you are obligated to not make fun of your brother or sister-in-law, even if you rightfully dislike them. Give some examples of positive and negative duties.

• 3. A ‘maxim’ is a guide or a general rule for our behavior. Explain the categorical imperative in your own words. What does it mean to make a “universal law” from one’s actions? You may have to refer to Kant’s four examples to understand what Kant means.
• 4. According to Kant, what’s wrong with hypothetical imperatives?
• 5. On page 279, Kant provides us with a ‘supreme practical principle’: “Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only.” What does it mean to treat everyone as an “end”? What might it mean to treat someone as a means to an end?
• 6. Write down several questions that you have about the text.

• 1. Summarize Kant’s position on lying.

• 2. Write whether or not you agree with Kant.

• 1. How often do you evaluate your own position?

• 2. Summarize how Bennet’s points about morality may be an objection to Kant.